We've traversed the acronym laden landscape of VoIP for you, and present you with the PC Authority guide to VoIP: what it is, what kinds of services you can find, what savings you can expect to make and how it is that you can go about setting up VoIP for yourself at home.

The HomePlug networking standard has been around in the States and other countries for a few years, and has proven a popular alternative to running CAT 5 cabling in your walls or for the (then) expensive cost of setting up a wireless network. HomePlug is wired networking for sure, but it uses an existing infrastructure in your office or domicile: your copper electricity power 'network' that feeds your TV, hair-dryer, fridge and any other electrical appliance the juice it needs to run. In short, HomePlug uses your house's electrical wiring.

There's no denying the appeal of broadband internet access and yet for a smart country Australia has been falling way behind our international counterparts.

Although similar products have been available (with much controversy) in the US for a few years, the Samsung DVD-H40A is the first Personal Video Recorder (PVR) to reach our sunny shores.

Finding a good PC or notebook for the family is not as hard as you might think. PC Authority  puts the latest models to the test.

It turns out that Microsoft [I]is[/I] bringing out Windows XP Media Center Edition in Australia, but until such time as it materialises -- and Microsoft Australia is being very sketchy on the dates -- those of us looking to integrate our PC media files with our televisions and hi-fi systems have to turn to bridging solutions.

The problem with having a DVD player, cable TV or a VCR is that when you want to use them you’re usually relegated to the lounge room where they’re set up, and not the secondary comfort of a spare room, the kitchen or your bedroom.

High contrast and fine focal abilities make this display perfectly suited for business or student users doing a lot of reading. Impressive sharpness and resolution scores make it a great companion to those doing desktop publishing or graphic manipulation.

The D900T has to be one the most impressively kitted out notebooks we've ever reviewed. Now, before you go running off with a fist full of readies, this notebook isn't available as such to the general public. Rather, resellers of Todaytech's notebooks can order them in whatever configuration you want. Or if you'd rather -- and we quite like this option -- you can order the notebook stripped of most options, and configure your own from spare parts or cheaper parts if you think you can do better on pricing.

19in widescreen LCD TV which shows much promise and is Dell’s first consumer offering in Australia. Spec-wise it looks quite good on paper, with 450cd/m2 brightness, 600:1 contrast ratio and 1280 x 768 widescreen resolution, and it doesn’t disappoint when fired up.

Hewlett Packard's new digital camera takes many steps in the right direction to introduce professional-level features for the consumer photographer, yet suffers from a few, minor flaws that detract from its overall polished design.

Wacom has been in the touchscreen and tablet industry for years, and is the manufacturer supplying the majority of screens for Tablet PCs. With the rise of interest in Tablet PCs, Wacom's local branch was keen to let us try out one of its newer standalone touchscreen products: the Cintiq.

Just over four months on from our massive hard drive roundup (October 2002, page 74), and Serial ATA (SATA) hard disks have finally arrived. Phew.

This USB dongle from MSI, like the dongle from Booya, proved a tiny USB device could deliver equal or better performance than you can get from a PCMCIA or PCI card.

You don't have to settle for printer that just prints. PC Authority tests six of the latest all-in-one devices.

As well as TV viewing (an analog tuner is built in) this screen's strength comes from its LCD-ness which makes it awesome for plugging into a PC (Media Center, anyone?) or for components like digital set-top boxes or DVD players.

It's a fair guess that if you're a frequent burner of optical media that you have more than a few scratched or dirty discs that can no longer be read by your drive.

The Caplio G3 is a 3.24-megapixel compact digital camera featuring a maximum optical resolution of 2,048 x 1,536, 3x zoom and auto and manual focus. It records images to 8MB of internal memory, SD or MMC media. It is capable of audio and video capture, video-out, and it can connect to a computer via USB.

The HP PhotoSmart 850 has a huge protruding lens, and a fairly fast-responding display and a clever feature that turns off either the viewfinder or the LCD if not required (depending on which one you're using at the time).